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1. Field of the Invention
The invention is related to the field of call processing systems, and in particular, to a system that provides personalized and customized services for call center customers waiting in a queue.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Customers calling call centers typically wait in queues depending on the availability of service agents and/or voice response units. A call is in a queue when the call is waiting and not being processed due to predetermined logic or call center resource unavailability. During this waiting period, call centers play music or pre-recorded messages to prevent the customer from abandoning the call and to take advantage of the waiting period. Some examples of these pre-recorded messages are messages informing the customer their position in the queue and advertising messages. Advertisers who play their messages to queued callers target a general audience of call center customers.
There are two drawbacks with only having the ability to target a general audience of call center customers. First, the advertising is less effective than targeting specific call center customers. Advertising dollars are wasted on queued callers who may not fit the demographic targeted by the marketing campaign. Ineffective advertisement not only wastes advertising dollars but also wastes time for the disinterested caller. In cases where a campaign for new products targets specific call center customers, a service agent identifies if the caller fits within the targeted demographic and then reads a sales pitch or product information from a script. However, this requires a large commitment of the service agents"" time to sell products which prevents them from handling what the call was originally made for. Therefore, less customers are served, and call response time increases.
The second drawback is a decreased level of customer satisfaction with messaging for general audiences. Typically, the caller is already displeased with being placed in a queue. Hearing a message that the caller has no interest in can only serve to further annoy the caller. Also, the impression given to the customer is that the customer is only one of many that the call center is trying to serve.
The invention solves the above problem by providing service information to a call in a queue for a call center based on caller data. The provision of service information such as advertising messages, audio entertainment, and interactive applications based on caller data creates a personalized and customized service for the customer. Initially, the invention receives caller data for the call in the queue for the call center. Caller data is data related to the caller such as caller number, called number, and caller provided information. The invention then identifies the service information based on the caller data and provides the service information to the call in the queue.
Two advantages of the invention are providing the ability to target specific call center customers and providing a new platform of service information for the call in the queue. The first advantage of providing the ability to target specific call center customers is a cost effective advertising solution. Advertising to specific target audiences who are more likely to buy the product or service offered yields a greater return on the advertising dollar. Marketing campaigns can then be enhanced to pinpoint certain customers for new products and services. A customer who previously ordered a breadmaker can hear about the new improved breadmaker model. Other customers not interested in breadmaking will not be burdened with hearing about the new improved breadmaker model. The invention also eliminates the time and cost burdens of having agents identify potential targets for advertising campaigns. Instead, the invention automatically identifies the appropriate advertising message to provide to the call center customer, which frees up service agents from selling new products. Therefore, service agents have more time to serve more customers further reducing call response times.
The second advantage of providing new platforms to the caller waiting in the queue is improved call center customer satisfaction. New advertising messages targeted directly to the customer give the impression that the customer is the only customer that the call center is serving. Also, the new service information such as personalized advertising, caller requested audio entertainment, and interactive caller games keeps the caller entertained and engaged, which reduces the rate of call abandonment.